


Salt And Stone: Chill

by Aithilin



Series: Salt and Stone [3]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Fluff, M/M, Mer!Noctis, MerNoct, season changes, seasonal fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-26
Updated: 2018-10-26
Packaged: 2019-08-07 16:22:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16411862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aithilin/pseuds/Aithilin
Summary: Nyx had never actually considered what winter would be like in Altissia.Set in mySalt and Stone'verse.





	Salt And Stone: Chill

**Author's Note:**

  * For [JazzRaft](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JazzRaft/gifts).



> This was prompted over at my [Tumblr](http://aithilin.tumblr.com/)

Nyx had never actually thought about winter in Altissia before. 

Spring and summer had been lovey— the temperate waters of the canal warming beneath the long days. The spring petals and flowers had clung to every surface like festival confetti— spots of vivid blossom colours against the damp stone paths and walls. He remembered the long, easy summer days, and warm nights. The heat of the season tempered by the coiling winds and rolling waves. The cascades that set themselves as a backdrop for the city— the levels upon levels of constructed stone across the bay— had offered cooling winds and spray, and a never-ending gush of refreshing waters. The haze of summer was lost in lazy long days and hazy soft street lights. 

Autumn had been a rush of reds and oranges from the trees on the land surrounding the bay— the green hills ablaze with colour for a few short weeks. The morning mist that wound its path across the canals had afforded Noctis an earlier cover of privacy when trailing Nyx home from the Maahgo. The mist had rippled and lifted, and Nyx had marvelled at the air of mystery the autumn gave the impossible city. The trees in the plazas had all turned— slowly and surely— with the more temperate climate of the Accordo islands. The greens lasted longer, the days faded slower. 

And Nyx didn’t realise that it was winter until he saw the city workers clearing out the empty planters and replacing the dead stalks of once-vibrant flowers with winter decorations. He looked up from his walk home through the early morning half-light to watch the lights being coiled around skeletal trees, and lanterns replacing pots of delicate flowers along the bridges and walkways. He saw the gondola drivers huddled together as they waited for fares, heaters glowing in the boats for passengers. Long sleeves and long scarves became the norm for those out during the darker hours. 

Nyx had only smiled at the time, with the idea of the city lit up during the long darks of the colder seasons. He smiled at the idea of a sprinkling of snow, or frost along the canals. 

He hadn’t thought of what it meant for creatures like Noctis. 

“They’re sleeping,” Ignis offered one late night, after a few days without Noctis’ visit to his doorstep. “The dark makes his highness more likely to sleep for longer hours.”

“Is that even possible?”

But Ignis had looked tired, himself, as he worked. He was given more opportunity to rest, to disappear for hours at a time when Weskham would normally have him tending the grills and oven. 

Nyx hadn’t thought about the winter in Altissia until Noctis made a sleepy visit to his doorstep. 

It appeared, to Nyx’s own observation, that the creatures changed during the colder months. Noctis’ dark tail was lighter in the grey waters, his skin more pallid. There was a blue tinge to lips and fingers, but Nyx was assured (repeatedly) that it was normal. 

Noctis was just slowing down for the cold season. 

Nyx had taken to setting out one of his own little heaters on the landing, where Noctis could curl close to it, a happy sigh with each sip of steaming coffee. There were mornings when he was certain that the prince was dozing in the heater’s glow, hands wrapped tightly around the favoured mug. 

“I should just turn human for this,” Noctis said one morning while he pulled himself close to the little radius of heat, tail tugged out of the water and coiled close to the warmth. “It would be easier.”

“Can you?” Nyx asked, draping a blanket across the creature’s shoulders in sympathy. His own apartment, while damp and dark on the lower levels of the city took the heat well. He had heaters, a fireplace, central heating that he had yet to use. The stone walls retained the warmth through the day, the thick blankets picked up from around the city, sent from home, managed him through the night. “Turn human like that.”

“Sort of.”

“Sort of?”

“It’s harder to turn back. And I don’t like walking.”

“If it’ll keep you warm, little star, I’ll carry you.”

Noctis smiled, and Nyx saw the more vivid changes that came with the cold in the water. He knew the chill of the deeper depths of the bay, and the ocean. He knew what it was to swim the dark, open seas, and the bonechill that stayed with him long after he left the white-capped, grey waves. He knew the reasons why the seasoned fishermen wore heavy sweaters and heavier coats when out on the ocean in the early mornings. He hadn’t thought the narrow, protected canals Noctis occupied were so bad. 

Noctis looked inhuman at the right angle— the creature of legend he had heard stories about for his childhood. Those wide, ice blue eyes, the pallid flesh, the tinge of blue to his lips, his hands, his skin— the mockery of the darker scales that coiled beneath him and shimmered in the light of the heater. The tangle of his hair was wild, the mess of sea and current, and the single shining bead tied neatly by his ear. 

“What if you went to warmer waters?” Nyx didn’t want him to go. He could follow. But warmer waters may not be safer, or close to land; “What about to the Oracle or—”

“I’m supposed to stay here.” Noctis peered over the edge of his mug, both hands still wrapped around the porcelain. Amusement shining in his eyes, the peek of fang catching on his lips; “With the Crystal to protect it.”

“Well, what do you normally do in winter?”

“Sleep.”

“Sleep?”

“That’s why I’m here. I’m going to sleep for a while. But I’ll wake up when it’s warmer.”

Nyx paused at that idea, and the image it conjured of Noctis curled in the seabed with his friends— coiled beneath mud and clay in the dark. “You hibernate? Do fish hibernate?”

“I’m not a fish.”

“No… But do you?”

“I guess? Does hibernate mean sleeping through the cold.”

“More or less.”

“Oh… Then yes.”

He reached out to stroke Noctis’ hair, to tame it away from his elfin features— drawn in the cold and looking more human the longer he stayed in the warmth. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather be human?”

“It’s harder to wake up after being human.” Smiling, Noctis leaned into the touch. “Maybe next year.”

“So when do you sleep?”

“Soon. I just wanted to visit you first.” Noctis tapped against the mug— the small fidgeting gestures that Nyx was still learning, still cataloguing. He wondered if Noctis would still be himself after a long sleep. If he would be more like the dazed animals he once saw on the mainland, on his home islands— the beasts of Niflheim waking in the thaws— wild and hungry and dazed in the spring heats. 

He wondered if Noctis would sense the passage of time, or if warm waters would rouse him from the depths, like some myth told about Leviathan and the Tidemother’s kin. 

“I’ll be here,” he said, instead of dwelling on the questions. Instead of asking Noctis for answers. He slipped his hand beneath the blanket to let his touch warm that pallid flesh; “when you wake up.”

“Promise?”

“Promise, little star.”


End file.
